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King Co Luxury Real Estate Up 10% – Luxury Home Sales Shifting From Seattle To The Eastside

Sales of luxury homes in the greater Seattle market have been rising for the past couple of years, and the most recent statistics confirm that the increases haven’t let up. Total luxury real estate sales in King County for 2012 thusfar have been up 9.8 percent as compared to the same point last year.

A total of 604 homes in King County have sold for over $1 million this year, including 91 homes over $2 million. The emergence of new jumbo credit options has certainly helped out the luxury buying crowd, but confidence in the local job market has also had a strong hand in turning high-end buyers from fence-sitters to big bidders.

An interesting side note in this upswing is the shift in luxury sales from Seattle proper to the Eastside. While King County luxury home sales are up, luxury sales within the city of Seattle are actually down 5.9 percent for the year. That number can be taken with a grain of salt, since overall Seattle sales are up around 15% for the year, but the luxury market was outpaced significantly just across Lake Washington.

Sales of luxury homes on the Eastside are up 23.9 percent so far this year (including Bellevue, Kirkland, Redmond, Mercer Island, Medina, Issaquah, Sammamish, the Points and Clyde Hill). There were 386 home sales of over $1 million so far this year on the Eastside, including 63 sales over $2 million (also an 8.6 percent increase). Clearly the confidence of luxury real estate buyers on the Eastside has returned in force, while the overall market in Seattle’s strength has not quite reignited the local luxury home buyers.